Midway Presents Arcade's Greatest Hits: The Atari Collection 1

"Great games that aren’t easy to emulate"

When I think American arcade developers the first name that enters my mind is Atari. Nolan Bushnell’s brainchild which first gave us Computer Space and Pong, and would come of age in the late 70s and early 80s, led the arcade revolution and pointed the way for just about everyone else that came after them. This collection, Arcade’s Greatest Hits: The Atari Collection for the Playstation by Midway and Digital Eclipse has six of the games that so many quarters back in the day, in the most successful attempt to bring home some games that were… uniquely controlled.

Included here are Asteroids, Tempest, Centipede, Missile Command, Super Breakout and Battlezone. All are emulated from the original arcade roms, as with the other arcade collections by this group. This is the first time that there’s a short CG movie with concepts from the six games included, and this one works pretty well. The menu gives you good looks at the cabinets this time, as well. And again, there are video clips with the original producers and images of the cabinets, flyers and other stuff relating to these games, including an Asteroids Halloween costume, believe it or not. I wonder how much that goes for on ebay these days. Instead of plain text this time, though, the narration is read aloud by a pleasant female announcer. Either way, it’s informative, and you’ll find out such tidbits like how Tempest was originally going to be a first person version of Space Invaders, or the significance of turtles to the design crew.

Anyhow, on to the games, all of which look and sound just like the originals.

Asteroids

One of the first arcade obsessions of many a player, Asteroids puts you in a vector-graphics field of the space-bound rocks, and you have to blast out of them before colliding with them. Making matters worse are unidentified flying objects that obviously don’t want you anywhere near here. You’ve got a thrust button, left and right rotate, fire and hyperspace, the last of which warps you to a random point on the field. Since this game’s controls weren’t joystick oriented, controlling with the gamepad takes getting used to. But it’s just how you remember it, if you had the chance to play it in the arcades.

Super Breakout

The original Breakout advertised “the ball bouncing in a whole new way,” marking it as the sequel to Pong. This seems to basically be the same game as the original Breakout. It plays like a weird single player racquetball where you’re trying to eliminate the blocks in your way with the ball. Miss the ball, and you lose your life. One of the easiest games to emulate out of the bunch here, it’s also the one that has aged the worst, since Arkanoid has managed to out-do it in every possible way. Pong itself might have actually been a better inclusion.

Missile Command

A tale of the consequences of nuclear war, Missile Command has you defending cities against a horde of enemy bombs, not to mention smart bombs, and various aircraft. You have three missile silos with which to defend the cities with, Alpha, Delta and Omega, and each is triggered by a specific button. That part of the game emulates fine, but the lack of a trackball here means targeting is a little trickier. This game has no big ending, only losing scenarios. “The End,” indeed.

Battlezone

Perhaps one of the most impressive early video games, this vector-graphics based game simulates the workings of a tank pretty well. It’s you vs. enemy tanks, guided missiles and even UFOs! Controlling the right and left tracks individually, you guide your tank from a first person perspective. This was the subject of several rumors, including that you could reach the active volcano in the background, and that a military training version was being produced. Both rumors are addressed in the history section of the disc. The game emulates pretty well for it’s unconventional controls, but I wish I could use my Dual Shock with this one.

Centipede

This was such a popular game, Atari raised the price on it and eventually had to release Millipede just so they could ship other products out! You’re in a forest of mushrooms having to contend with giant centipedes, spiders, fleas and scorpions, each of which does something different to make life harder for you. Shoot the centipede down, and on to the next, harder level. This game emulates very well, since the trackball functions translate well to the gamepad. It’s one of my all-time favorites, but it’s not the main reason to own this collection.

Tempest

This one is. Monsters represented by color vector graphics are coming out of a hole and you have to shoot them down before they reach your level. Some creatures split in two, some create nasty spikes which you’ll have to contend with when descending to the next levels. Originally using a dial controller to maneuver around the playfield, this game is emulated so that left rotates you clockwise, and right goes counterclockwise. While a little finesse is lost in the translation, this is bar-none the best home version of Tempest I’ve ever played.

Five genuine classics and a game that provides more historical perspective than anything else, this is a pretty easy collection to recommend to classic video game buffs like myself. It’s also becoming pretty scarce today, since most Playstation arcade collections are disappearing quickly. So if you see it, and liked the games back then, grab it.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 09/30/02, Updated 09/30/02